Justin Burwinkel, a Doctor of Audiology with an eye for photography, spent Major League Baseball’s All-Star Week in his hometown of Cincinnati, Ohio, enjoying all the festivities. Lucky for us, he also brought along some mustache props that he uses for wedding photography! The results are an absolute delight – a collection of smiling faces at Cincinnati landmarks, sporting Whisker Works ‘staches. We’re tickled. Mustaches were the theme of this year’s All-Star Game, as noted in our previous post.

Justin’s broad photographic portfolio definitely demonstrates a keen eye – especially from a man who spends most of his time improving others’ hearing. There’s a clear passion for the art in his work. From images celebrating rustic charm, to stunning portraits in scenic outdoor settings, to dreamlike wedding photos, Justin captures emotion and communicates it in a way that makes you truly appreciate the art form and the artist behind this work.

Take a look at the photos from Cincinnati, and please browse through Justin’s gallery over at justinburwinkel.com. You’ll enjoy the view.

As baseball’s All-Star Game approaches, the city of Cincinnati has gotten in the spirt in part by decorating its downtown with eight-foot handlebar mustache benches. Baseball’s Cincinnati Reds — originally the “Red Stockings” — were a team full of mustachioed players, and the city’s new decor reflects that heritage.

Huge mustache-shaped benches scattered around downtown Cincinnati, Ohio will help get guests in the spirit of things as the city plays host to the 2015 Major League Baseball All-Star Game on July 14th. The Reds, the team hosting this year’s big game, went mustache crazy to promote the team, the sport and the city.

Along with the 8-foot, 850-pound handlebar mustache benches decorated in a variety of styles, the team is promoting a mustache-focused logo and otherwise advertising that baseball and mustaches were once so intertwined it would take an experienced barber an afternoon to make sense of it all. City skycrapers near the baseball stadium are getting in the act, too. Already the nearby Scripps Center features an imposing mustache and old-timey baseball cap at the top of the building. Nearby another landmark tower will feature a 30-foot projection of a historic mustachioed player.

Mustaches absolutely dominated baseball in the late 1800s, as exemplified by John Ward of the New York (now San Francisco) Giants. Sadly, by 1895 mustaches had fallen out of fashion, and were essentially vanished by the early 1900s.

There once was a time when playing baseball mustacheless was unheard of. Nose neighbors dominated the sport’s facial fashions in the late 1800s before abruptly vanishing by the 1910s — save for the outlying team manager. Some say batters with mustaches interfered with the pitcher’s concentration. Others said the pitcher’s mustache was at fault, mesmerizing otherwise talented and focused batters. The players formed an agreement that none would wear mustaches during the regular season. At first, mustache-enamored fans revolted, only gradually re-warming to the game we know today as America’s national pastime.

The annual rite of facial hair abandon known as “Mustache March” may be officially and technically over for the year, but it’s still going strong in spirit, and on the faces of proud deniers now deep into Mustache Mapril revelry.

Just when you thought it was safe to go outside clean-shaven comes the revelation that the U.S. Air Force, or at least one unit within it, released a video acknowledging the existence of Mustache March and the official connection between the military branch and the now simultaneously beloved and reviled tradition.

It’s still Mustache Mapril for two more weeks, to be followed by Mustache May, Mune, Muly, Maugust, Meptember, Moctober, Movember (recognized outside fanatic circles), Mecember, Manuary and Mebruary. Bear in mind that for those ashamed to have shaved “prematurely,” WhiskerWorks.com still shamelessly supports mustache junkies with prosthetics that may actually outshine what you were, are or believe to be capable of growing yourself.

President William Howard Taft may not have known it, but when he left office in March 2013, he took the presidential mustache with him. (Photo courtesy of the U.S. National Archives)

America bid farewell to mustaches in the Oval Office 100 years ago this month with the departure of President William Howard Taft, the nation’s last leader to sport facial hair of any kind while in office. As a bellwether of national trends, presidential styles help establish what is acceptable, popular and admirable.

America has long held men of mustachioed magnificence in high regard, some of them celebrated to this day. Take Taft’s predecessor, President Theodore Roosevelt, the adventuring man’s man, legendary in his horseback-riding and gun-slinging, love of hunting and of wild lands. Once shot in the abdomen immediately before a scheduled campaign speech, Roosevelt famously opted to forgo hospitalization to deliver 90 minutes of oratory, bleeding through his shirt as he spoke. He clearly was a man who lived the philosophy, “with great mustache comes great responsibility.”

Albert Einstein, a man whose mind single-handedly advanced the course of civilization, too found might in a nose neighbor. Eccentric painter Salvador Dali, with his famed upside-down handlebar mustache, and Charlie Chaplain, renown silent-film comic star, both delighted the public in part through mustachery. Later on, “talkie” actor Tom Selleck wielded his own mustache against criminal scum in a T-top Ferrari.

Geraldo Rivera, a rare modern mustachioed professional, carries on the tradition of fashionable, high-profile mustaches with his broad, bold statement of shaving defiance. Each of these men deserves a plastic mustache in their honor. You’ll find them at WhiskerWorks.com. Geraldo’s and Dali’s will be easy to find — and Tom Selleck’s, well, that’s “The Captain.”

The tradition of silliness that is April Fools Day offers a welcome opportunity to eschew seriousness.

April Fools Day takes different names and forms, but the concept of a day of pranks and silliness has been around for centuries — possibly dating back to 536 BC. Iranians treat the 13th day of the Persian new year, which falls on April 1 or 2, as a holiday for pranking familiar to much of the western world. Called Sizdah Be-dar, the holiday is focused mostly on celebrating the start of the spring season, but among its traditions is prankery.

Similar traditions are celebrated throughout the world, including in Belgium, Italy, France and French-speaking Canada, where it’s common to attach paper fish to victims’ backs surreptitiously as a joke. References to the day in these nations make direct reference to fish, such as “Pesce d’Aprile” in Italian.

Traditions vary, including the extreme practice in Belgian Flemish culture of children locking their parents out of their homes with a demand of treats in exchange for entry. Light-heartedness, though, is typically the order of the day. What better way to inspire merriment than to cavort about with a perpetual smile, a la “The Tease,” or a big silly inspector’s mustache and monocle? Check ’em out at WhiskerWorks.com, where there’s a 20% off sale through the end of March.

U.S. Air Force Brig. Gen. Robin Olds defied regulations in protest by wearing a grand handlebar mustache. Eventually a general told him to ditch it, but not before inspiring what’s now military tradition in March.

As we near the annual facial-hair dare known as “Mustache March,” let’s take a quick look back at the man many would say gave birth to the movement, through unabashed mustachioed defiance.

United States Air Force Brigadier General Robin Olds, famed for his defiantly out-of-regulation mustache during the Vietnam War, inspired fellow airmen to grow mustaches of their own, instilling a spirit of camaraderie. The bond the mustache forged among the men was enough for those higher up in the chain of command to ignore the obvious defiance of facial hair regulation. That is, until Olds returned home, when a general commanded him, finger pointed directly at the famed mustache, to get rid of it. Olds, having grown tired of the mustache anyway, replied simply, “Yes, sir.”

His defiant, heavily waxed handlebar mustache, which stretched beyond the edge of his lips in violation of grooming standards, was said to be a protest against the Air Forces’ inadequate pilot training and lackluster support. More importantly, it’s believed this defiant ‘stache gave birth to Mustache March, an annual tradition in the Air Force, which spread to the other American service branches and the general public, when men grow mustaches as a bonding exercise, in defiance of clean-shaven normalcy.

Olds lived a truly manly life, flying in an open-air biplane at the age of 8 and pledging to become a pilot, excelling at football while at West Point Military Academy, earning a place in the College Football Hall of Fame. He married a Hollywood actress, Ella Raines, and had a generally high-profile life as an accomplished battle-tested fighter pilot in World War II and Vietnam. He earned acclaim as the top wing commander in the latter conflict as a man who knew how to command the respect of his subordinates and contemporaries.

Though his mustache was said to give him superpowers, possibly even immortality, he died of natural causes in 2007, leaving the world to speculate whether it was the mustache that made him great, or if he made the mustache great.

Mustache March is also the namesake of an organized charity mustache-growing competition based in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, which donates money raised during the month-long nose neighbor cultivation exercise to Midwest Athletes Against Childhood Cancer. Moustache March, the other accepted spelling, is the namesake of an organization based in Oregon that, too, uses March-focused mustache growing as a means of fundraising for charity, including the American Cancer Society. Along the same lines, there’s Mustache Movember, a global organization focused on raising money for testicular and prostate cancer research.

Though no one knows who invented the mustache, modern mustache popularity is almost certainly attributable to Robin Olds, to whom, in the spirit of all the mustache embodies, we say thank you. In celebration of Mustache March, Whisker Works will hold a sale with special promotional pricing on top quality mustaches, to help less-endowed gentlemen and ladies honor Olds’ legacy.